The Nineteenth Byte

3:20 AM

hmmm

in a prefix language, what would be the syntax for foo.bar

since... if you make it get foo bar then wouldn't set be set get foo bar value

also, asked this before but worded badly: should the standard library use more advanced features (that require importing libraries) for conciseness/to show more examples of uses of the language?

oh, and... would there be any nice way to make special functions? (like... python uses global functions instead, JS uses symbols as keys (which is not a bad idea))

oh actually: is it a bad idea to make methods actually global functions for a prefix language? if so, what would the syntax be for some kind of... global static method i guess? as in a function where the argument of the enclosing type is not the first argument

oh. and... is there any possible nice syntax for conditional definitions

like... some functions require another module, but they're not important so only should be loaded if both modules are loaded

ASCII-only

3:51 AM

also, should arrays of mixed type be treated as tuples if type unions are a thing (so... type_union[] vs tuple)? assume list destructuring is a thing, i.e. [foo a, bar b] = list would work from both types - would one make more sense over the other in this case?

New Main Posts

0

Q: Generate password code golf

just another way to create a password it is very hard to remember my password, so I came up with a way to create a password that i can generate The way i generate my password is from a word or a sentence and follow these steps 1- start from left to right 2- find the count of each letter 3- p...

Anonymous

4:05 AM

@ASCII-only Why not just set foo bar value?

ASCII-only

@Mego what about 1. foo = value and 2. foo.bar.baz = value

hmm

i guess you could do set property [foo bar baz] (or get) or something

Anonymous

@ASCII-only 1. set foo value; 2. set get foo bar baz value

ASCII-only

@Mego what if there are no overloads/variable arguments

Anonymous

@ASCII-only Then set foo value and setprop foo bar value

Anonymous

You can make setprop foo bar value === set get foo bar value under the hood, but setprop would be more useful

ASCII-only

4:07 AM

hmm. i guess i should then rename get to getprop for consistency?

Anonymous

Sure

ASCII-only

well, *remove get, add getprop

Anonymous

get could still be a useful name for references, like set foo bar (get baz) as foo.bar = &baz (C++-ish)

Veskah

Pro-tip: Two spaces is the same as one space twice

ASCII-only

6:38 AM

@Veskah :O what? mind=blown

@Mego imo that's not obvious enough, for that i'd go with address_of/addr or something

btw @mego :

3 hours ago, by ASCII-only

also, asked this before but worded badly: should the standard library use more advanced features (that require importing libraries) for conciseness/to show more examples of uses of the language?

dzaima

7:15 AM

python what

ASCII-only

@dzaima generators is why, as the answer explains

if you don't like it switch to python2 :P

but... yeah that really is very, very counterintuitive

dzaima

@ASCII-only but the fact that one instance of array there references the original and the other, the replacement

ASCII-only

7:29 AM

true

hmm

if every object has an AST type (e.g. 1 would be IntegerLiteral), and an actual type, what about ast nodes themselves?

would both be the same?

and... i wonder if there would ever be a case in which both types being the same would be bad, when you want to pattern match something based on type

ok. if functions are generics, what type would they be (since they also can have any number of args)

tuple type, i guess? or are haskell's type signatures a better idea? i.e. (a, b) -> result or a -> b -> result?? (i'm guessing the linked list/currying style of haskell isn't really useful if there is no partial application built into the syntax?)

Downgoat

8:06 AM

@ASCII-only yeah sure

ASCII-only

@Downgoat but it would mean more dependencies. i guess that doesn't really matter that much?

New Sandboxed Posts

1:47 PM

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A: Sandbox for Proposed Challenges

Drawing \$K_n\$ (complete graph with \$n\$ vertices) In graph theory the complete graph with \$n\$ vertices, often written as \$K_n\$, is the graph where every vertex is connected to every other vertex. For example, \$K_3\$ with \$V = \{A,B,C\}\$ has the edges \$\bigr\{\{A,B\},\{B,C\},\{C,A\}\bi...

New Main Posts

2:06 PM

0

Q: Count the Closed Polygons

Input: An NxM grid or multi-line string (or other reasonable input-format), containing only printable ASCII (unicode range [32,126]). Output: The amount of closed polygons of the same character that can be found, with two special rules: Spaces are wildcards and can be used (multiple times) f...

code-golf geometry grid

Anonymous

@ASCII-only The standard library should be as clean and performant as possible

Skidsdev

Unwrapping a 3d cube array into a 1d array can be done with x * CubeSize * CubeSize + y * CubeSize + z right?

Luis felipe De jesus Munoz

3:41 PM

How do I write hidden text in a post?

J. Sallé

@LuisfelipeDejesusMunoz if you're talking about the spoiler block, you need a >! in front of whatever text you want hidden.

If you want comments, the standard html comment syntax applies 

BMO

4:15 PM

Why was this question put on hold?

Can we please reopen it..

Dennis

I was going to hammer it, but I have a question that I feel should be answered first.

In what way should we sort uppercase and lowercase versions of the same letter? — Dennis ♦ 1 min ago

BMO

@Dennis: (5) Keep the case for the last letter

Or am I missing something?

Dennis

OK, now I feel I didn't understand the challenge at all.

I don't understand how casing works. Could you please elaborate? — Dennis ♦ 9 secs ago

BMO

It's not about codepoints, maybe that's that?

Dennis

Ah, I think I got it. We're supposed to group case-insensitively and use the case of the last occurrence of the letter in the output. That could definitely use some clearer wording.

BMO

4:29 PM

@Dennis I find that hard to believe, 11 people (12 counting me) understood.

@Dennis Yes

Dennis

Well, I completely misunderstood it the first time I read it, hence my nonsensical for comment.

So given that 5 users voted to close, that makes at least six who were confused by something.

BMO

+12/-6 then

Dennis

That's an unacceptable ratio of people who didn't understand the challenge.

BMO

But it clearly states letters and alphabetically and never goes on to say anything about some specific encoding.

Some challenges assume way more than "you need to know the alphabet", I don't think they need to explain how the alphabet works

Dennis

Any objections to editing 5 to the following?

> Group letters ignoring case. In the output, use the case of the last occurrence in the input.

BMO

4:32 PM

No, sounds good to me

Dennis

@BMO Believe it or not, I do know the alphabet.

BMO

@Dennis Hence, I did not believe you when you said you didn't understand how casing works.

Dennis

For the challenge, not in general...

AdmBorkBork

> "ab-ca-def-gi-jeckle-mi-nop-kwer-stoov-wix-iz" - Big Bird

Stewie Griffin

6:13 PM

Every time I see our Roomba move randomly around our house, I think: This could be a nice challenge!

Input: A matrix representing a house/room with 1=obstacles, 0=floor.
Challenge: You'll write a controller for the roomba. You start in a specified spot, and must cover the entire floor. The roomba can't see anything, so it doesn't know the size of the room, nor where obstacles are, until it crashes into it.
Score: Lowest traveled distance

Erik the Outgolfer

hm... maybe already done?

Stewie Griffin

What are your thoughts? I'm unsure about the scoring, and I'm not sure how to specify it.

Erik the Outgolfer

is this not code-golf?

because I'm pretty sure I can just brute-force my way to optimality

Quintec

@StewieGriffin I'm pretty sure every submission would have lowest traveled distance, it's not . ahard algorthim

Stewie Griffin

I guess there must be some "hidden boards". I'm not sure how to do this properly though.

Erik the Outgolfer

6:16 PM

no, I'm not talking about hardcoding

it's pretty easy to brute-force starting from lowest and going to higher travel distance

Stewie Griffin

I think it's quite hard, since you have no information about the room in advance.

Erik the Outgolfer

oh, so you can't see the input?

Stewie Griffin

No

You have the same information a roomba would have. I.e. nothing.

Erik the Outgolfer

then I guess we would have to implement an algorithm for something similar to the Trace game

Stewie Griffin

I'm fairly sure most algorithms would fail to cover all the floor space, if the room was made complicated enough.

Erik the Outgolfer

6:18 PM

like, given a path, cover it in whole without visiting a space more than once... except that if you're at a dead end you can go back

Stewie Griffin

... googling Trace game ...

Erik the Outgolfer

oh, you won't have luck googling :P

Stewie Griffin

But you can, and likely should cross your own path many times.

Erik the Outgolfer

you might also know it as "fill in room" or something (I've forgotten its name)

(the app got flagged by Play Protect)

Stewie Griffin

But I guess such a game has a known room layout in advance?

Erik the Outgolfer

6:21 PM

yep

not knowing the room in advance does make it harder

Stewie Griffin

Why I had this idea: The algorithm the Roomba uses can't be optimal, since it walks around pretty randomly, and it crosses its own path many many many times.

Erik the Outgolfer

your roomba should also know its way around after the 50th time... :P

Stewie Griffin

I always think: The people on PPCG could definitely create a better algorithm than this.

@EriktheOutgolfer but I might move a chair or something... Then it must start from scratch again.

Erik the Outgolfer

yeah, thought about that

Stewie Griffin

So, do you think it's a viable challenge idea?

Erik the Outgolfer

6:25 PM

although then I guess it should use some sort of "threshold radius" system, that is, if it detects an object being moved from where it was in the past, or one being put where nothing was the in the past, delete all data in a circle with some radius r and the changed spot as its center

(r is ideally changeable)

@StewieGriffin definitely

although... how are you going to convince roomba manufacturers to put a better algorithm in there... and how much would you charge for it? ;) prepares lawsuit

Stewie Griffin

I thought of that too! :)

Erik the Outgolfer

@StewieGriffin so, is this basically a king-of-the-hill but with each bot taking its time alone? :P